While taking the witness stand the day prior, Spence tried to explain how she felt threatened and feared for her life while working as a security guard at the Royal Farms store on Washington Boulevard in Baltimore. But it seems other evidence in her trial convinced jurors she was guilty of second-degree murder for the shooting death of 26-year-old Marquise Powell.
A man was found guilty of manslaughter on Friday in the deadly shooting of an off-duty Howard County sheriff’s deputy outside a bar in Federal Hill. Jewel Crowder, 41, of Baltimore, was convicted in Baltimore Circuit Court of voluntary manslaughter, use of a handgun during the commission of a crime of violence and reckless endangerment in the killing of Ryan Demby, which happened on South Charles Street near East Cross Street on Sept. 29, 2023. He was 23. The jury, however, found Crowder not guilty of first- and second-degree murder. The verdict means that jurors determined that Crowder acted in partial defense of another person.
Expressing that it was important to identify those who gamble with the credibility of law enforcement and the integrity of criminal cases, Baltimore State’s Attorney Ivan Bates released a list of current and former police officers his office would not call to testify under any circumstances.
“We will pursue this case with the utmost diligence, ensuring that all evidence is scrutinized and every legal avenue explored. Our message is clear: no act of terror will overshadow the strength and resilience of Baltimore or its residents,” Baltimore State’s Attorney Ivan J. Bates said in a Thursday news release.
"It’s extremely difficult when you have 30 people shot, when you can’t talk to a lot of the folks that were there," said Scott. "We have to figure out a way to protect people’s rights, especially young people, but we also have to find a way to make sure we can bring justice for families and do that in the right way."
In a news release, Bates said the charges against the women would have been dismissed via the city’s citation docket program after the completion of community service had the three been cited rather than arrested.
The defendant asked to be sentenced immediately after a jury found him guilty Tuesday of three counts of murder in the killings of 24-year-old Shiand Miller, who was about eight months pregnant, and her 3-year-old daughter, Shaniya Gilmore, a spokesperson for the Baltimore State’s Attorney’s Office said in an email.
However, instead of granting a brief postponement, Judge Melissa Phinn demanded the state move forward with a new council. When the state refused, the case was dismissed. A call, local attorney and former city prosecutor Jeremy Eldridge deemed “highly unusual.”
“Justice has been served,” Eggleston’s aunt, Sanobia Wilson, said of the verdict. “To sit here and put up with this for six years — six long years — I can’t even begin to tell you how the struggle was. It was devastating.”
